


Noir

by Kazroo



Category: Tarzan the WB series
Genre: Challenge from TTS forum, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-23
Updated: 2015-02-23
Packaged: 2018-03-14 16:57:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3418415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kazroo/pseuds/Kazroo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Private eye Partick "Rick" Nash does his best to avoid Richard Clayton as he tries to hire him to find his missing family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Noir

“Noir”

“I told you last time – I’m not interested.”

Why can’t he leave me alone? I slammed down the receiver hard enough to make the bell ding. Paying jobs may not be following me around these days – but I’m no fool. I’d be willing to bet that Clayton was keeping all other business away from my door. He’s got the power and the money, but why me? I’m just a second rate private dick – former army brat with a knack for finding things no one else could or all else had given up on. The not giving up part is the only thing I have in common with Clayton. He’d been looking for his brother’s family since the day they went missing. Damn shame too – that brother’s wife was a hell of a dame.

Sitting and waiting for jobs that aren’t coming is wearing thin. Ah, the mail’s here – at least I can enjoy my mounting bills. It seems crossing the room is the only exercise I get these days – and martini olives are my only green vegetables. No wonder the acid is eating a hole in my stomach as I speak. Hmmm…electric bill, water bill…bar tab – I think I should change bars with prices like these. But what’s this? Heavy off-white paper – and what do I smell? _Sniff_. Rose water. High class stuff too.

“Meet me at your favorite bar – you won’t be disappointed.”

The message was clear, but a bit too cryptic. Was Clayton trying a new tact? 

No post mark. In spite of my gut feeling that I was walking into a trap, I took my grey felt fedora off the coat rack by the door and pulled it down tight. I pulled down the slats on the window blinds to get a better view of the street. It looked all clear. If that note was hand delivered, no one was hanging around for a tip.

As I headed over the road, I heard the rumble right behind me.

“Arooga…Arooga.”

Damn that Flanders – half blind and still patrolling the streets in that model T.

“Use your brakes you damn fool,” I yelled. But he couldn’t hear me over the sound of his engine, and he sure as hell didn’t see me! I was eye to eye with the Ford and about to have his license plate number replace my face. I dove toward the curb. The car missed me; the curb didn’t. I could feel the blood trickling out of my nose. I pulled the handkerchief out of my breast pocket and wished I had a bullet to bite down on right now. It was broken – I knew it. The same thing that ended my “career” as a boxer in my first fight. Hey, maybe on the bright side this will set my nose back to straight.

Now I really could use a drink, no matter what it cost. As if on cue, I heard the intro to Harlem Nocturne begin on an E flat Alto Sax the moment I turned the knob. Just because I’m a private dick doesn’t make me a Raymond Chandler creation in need of a theme song.

I sauntered up to the bar, blood stained nose-rag held to my upper lip.

“Could I get some ice in a napkin, Joe?” I nasally inquired of the house of a bartender while studying his bemused face.

“Sure thing, Rick. Looks like the old bone rattler shook you up.”

“They should get that man off the streets.”

I shook my head, but stopped it quickly. My head was throbbing.

“Can I get two fingers of Whiskey?” I asked, looking at the clientele around the bar. Rings of smoke hung like halos over their heads, but not one of them could be considered an angel.

Joe handed over my drink. I lifted it to chin level, nodded slightly, and slipped the rim of the glass under the wad of cotton cloth that was keeping the blood out of my drink. After taking a sip, I chanced taking the pressure off my nose.

“How’s it look?” I asked Joe.

“Like hell – but I think it straightened out that hook you used to have.”

Well, that confirmed that idea.

“Here’s that ice, Rick. Need a refill?”

I took the cocktail napkin and touched the ice to the bridge of my nose. My eyes rolled into my head like the tricky window shade on my office door and I could see stars through my eyelids.

“I’ll take the gritting teeth as a yes on the refill,” Joe quipped, taking back the glass and letting the whiskey glug glug up to the two finger mark yet again.

“Thanks Joe,” I said, moving away from the bar and taking up a place at a table where I could watch the bar door and my office across the street.

No one moved from the bar the whole time I waited. Times were tough, but somehow these guys ‘found’ a way to sit all day drinking in a dive bar. Of course, I would spend the whole day here myself if I didn’t have an office. But those days might be over soon, so I could become one of those guys at the bar.

Even before the door opened, I smelled the scent of roses. I would have taken in a deeper breath, but with the state of my nose I was just glad I could still smell at all. I leaned back in my chair and pulled the fedora down as far as I could, considering the ice, hoping it would look like I was napping, or at the least not paying attention.

She walked in and the whole place smelled just like the letter. Her clingy dress was in a zig-zag patterned fabric, and it zigged and zagged in all the right places on her curvaceous form. I followed her with my eyes and studied every inch. An almost black mane of well coifed hair fell just short of her waist. Between the cinched waist and the zig-zags her bottom was perfectly heart shaped – and those gams! Those stocking seams were pin straight and just called my hand to stroke from her hem to her ankles. She turned and leaned against the bar, jutting her chest forward and her shoulders back.

From the small bag resting on her forearm she produced an elegant cigarette holder with a pristine cigarette in its grasp. I watched every man at the bar fumble for a lighter in hopes of lighting her up. Dreamers – one and all.

I took the ice off my nose and straightened up. This was well worth it – just like the note had said. I stood, took my glass in hand and headed back to the bar. She caught my eyes for a moment, and it gave me a chill. She was smiling like a snake – I just couldn’t tell if she was venomous or if she’d just squeeze the life out of me.

“If you’re going to ask if I need a light, like I told the rest, no thanks.”

I ignored her, handed Joe my glass and asked for another drink. She sucked in her cheeks and her lip curled down as her eyes became hooded.

“Sorry – did you say something?” I teased. “Thanks Joe.”

She wrapped a serpentine finger around her cigarette holder, pulling the tip from her lips.

“Mr. Nash.”

I turned my eyes back toward her and raised a brow.

“Yes?”

“I think we have business to discuss.”

“What business might that be?”

“Let me introduce myself. My name is Kathleen Clayton,” she purred.

So much for my luck changing – it was a trap – the perfect man trap.

“Miss Clayton, I’ve already told your brother, I have no intention of traveling halfway around the world to look for bones.”

I began to turn away, but she snatched my fedora and settled it on her own head.

“Mr. Nash…Patrick,” she added, leaning in and tracing her cigarette holder down the center of my chest.

“It’s Rick,” I replied, trying to take my hat back. She blocked my hand and then ran her fingernails in a trail to my shoulder.

“Rick…it would be a real shame if you were to have to close your agency. I could…get my brother to…change his mind about ruining you.”

“But only if I change my mind first?”

“You’re a smart man Mr…Rick.”

She tickled the back of my neck with a spiraling fingernail – they were blood red, I just hope not with my blood before this was done.

“Besides, it would be quite a shame if I never got to see you in safari shorts and a pith helmet.”

She put my hat back on my head then flicked the brim to look into my eyes again.

“My card, Rick. I’ll be expecting your call…Oh, by the way, my brother just bought the building your office is in.”

She slipped past me and walked to the door, her bottom seeming to do the Samba. She looked over her shoulder and blew me a kiss as she egressed. She had just tied my hands and she knew it. But if someone was going to get me in a clinch, she certainly smelled better than her brother.

When I got home there was a box in the hall addressed to me. It was too small to be one of Clayton’s hired henchmen, so I opened it. A note fluttered out onto the floor, and like it had a life of its own, it jumped each time I reached for it. I nailed it down with my foot and tore the corner picking it up.

[i]‘I took the liberty of outfitting you for the trip so we’ll match. My brother will be in touch to finalize the itinerary.  
K. Clayton’[/i]

Once inside, I placed the box on my bed and stared at it. I sat and crossed my feet on the corner of the bed. So much for being my own man. Once you work for the Claytons, your life is no longer your own.

I decided to try on my ‘safari’ clothes. Either Kathleen was a good judge of size – I shudder at the thought that Richard Clayton could judge my size on sight – or they had had me traced in my sleep. It was perfectly tailored to fit me. Even the hat fit. I looked ridiculous as far as I was concerned.

I shouldn’t have been surprised when the knock came on my door, but I hit the edge of the pith helmet and it hit the floor, rattling around and around as it vibrated to a stop.

“Just a minute,” I called. There was no way to get out of this get-up before I answered the door. Waiting out in the hall was surprise number two – Kathleen Clayton in a trench coat.

“Should I take this as a good sign?” she asked, collecting the pith helmet from her path. She spun the helmet by its edge, and it flew the length of my bed before it landed. She slowly untied the belt on her trench coat, turned her back on me, and shimmied her shoulders free. I stepped back while my heart jumped into my throat. She smiled the moment she saw my wide eyes.

“What did you think?”

My face told her exactly what I was thinking, and it made her laugh.

“My tailor did a nice job,” she said as she circled me. If there had been more than one of her I would have thought I was in a pool of piranha. She checked every pleat and seam – even refolded my socks over the hiking boots.

“Now we match.”

“I was about to take this off,” I told her. She just sat on my bed.

“Don’t let me stop you.”

I don’t blush easily – but that did the trick.

“Why are you here?” I asked, putting my hand on my hip and trying to give her a stony stare.

“I brought your papers – new passport – your immunizations – tsk – you need quite a few shots before we leave. Please don’t tell me you’re afraid of needles. It would ruin your image.”

This woman was a puzzle, and I didn’t have all the pieces yet.

“I didn’t say I’d take the job.”

Again, she just smiled.

“The padlock on your office door says otherwise.”

I threw my hands into the air, and would have thrown myself on the bed in disgust had she not been in my way.

“I told my brother it would take a more aggressive approach to convince you, and I don’t play fair.”

“Thanks a lot,” I sneered, opening the only window in my apartment. I repeatedly tapped my forehead against the window sash hoping to wake up from this nightmare.

I froze when I felt her hand on the small of my back.

“Think about it, Rick.”

“You’re going to get me killed.”

“Nonsense – my brother has gone on these trips for years. He always comes back.”

“But the same can’t be said for those who go with him!”

“So you aren’t coming? You are willing to let my brother take your job, and whatever else he wants?”

Her other hand was tip-toeing up my chest until she reached my chin. She turned my face. I now knew what kind of snake she was – a boa constrictor with about three loops wrapped around me already.

“I’ll make it worth your while.”

Those words had strings attached all over them. This must be what a male praying mantis feels like in mating season. Kathleen Clayton was a looker, and in those shorts there weren’t even stockings to get in the way. If a fantasy could come to life – she would be it. But like the praying mantis, the price was very high.

“I think you should leave, Miss Clayton.”

I put some space between us. She looked quite peeved. Again her eyes hooded, and I feared a stiletto between the shoulder blades.

She slapped me across the face, gathered her coat, and was gone. That was one hot blooded woman. I could have told her I decided to go on her brother’s bone expedition, but it was more fun this way.

My face was still stinging an hour later when I called Richard Clayton and told him I’d come along. He gave me the name of the doctor who would take care of my shots, and he was sure to tell me the padlock would come off my office door as soon as we []ireturned[/i] from the expedition. I doubted I’d still be alive by then, but he thought it would motivate me in some way.

“Kathleen was fuming when she returned. I like a man who can make my sister froth. This should be an interesting trip.”

He hung up the phone before I could say anything in return.

I was beginning to wonder what to fear more – the trip itself, or Kathleen Clayton coming on the trip.

It took several months to get my immunity ready for international travel. At least three of the vaccines made me sick, but Clayton paid my bills – not just medical, but rent, power, and whatever else cropped up in the interim.

By the time departure day came, I had faced my mortality so many times that the trip didn’t seem so bad. I put on my safari wear, made sure my updated will was in effect, and waited for the Clayton caravan. At least I wasn’t the only person in New York who looked this stupid. As bad as I looked in khaki, Richard Clayton looked like last year’s scarecrow.

It was a thirteen man team – good thing I’m not superstitious.

I sure hope I survive.


End file.
